Joost’s interpretation is profound, unpretentious and soulful.
— Leipziger Volkszeitung
Estonian conductor Risto Joost is acclaimed for his artistic versatility and has gained widespread recognition for his work both in the opera pit and on the concert stage.
Since the 2024/25 season, Risto Joost has served as Chief Conductor of the Württemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn, and since the 2020/21 season, he has also held the position of Artistic Director and Chief Conductor of the Estonian National Theatre Vanemuine in Tartu.
He has previously held major artistic positions such as Chief Conductor of the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra and Brigitta Festival and has been a long-standing conductor of the Estonian National Opera.
Risto Joost is in demand as a guest conductor with orchestras such as the Helsinki Philharmonic, Bergen Philharmonic, Norwegian National Opera Orchestra, Tampere Philharmonic, Trondheim Symphony, Kristiansand Symphony, Odense Symphony, Aalborg Symphony, Tapiola Sinfonietta, Oulu Sinfonia, Latvian National Symphony, and the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra. He has also appeared with the Orchestra Filarmonica della Fenice, Bavarian State Orchestra, MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony, Netherlands Philharmonic, Noord Nederlands Orkest, Netherlands Chamber Orchestra, Antwerp Symphony, Flanders Symphony, Baroque Orchestra B’Rock, Gulbenkian Orchestra, Strasbourg Philharmonic, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, Slovenian Philharmonic, Prague Radio Symphony, Brno Philharmonic, and the Janáček Philharmonic, among others.
In the 2025/26 season, he is scheduled to conduct the Helsinki Philharmonic, Noord Nederlands Orkest, Kuopio Symphony, and Liepāja Symphony, among others. At the Estonian National Theatre Vanemuine, he will conduct Mahler’s Symphony No. 3, Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra, Strauss’s Eine Alpensinfonie, La Traviata (new production), and The Rite of Spring (ballet).
Between the 2026 and 2029 seasons, he will present Richard Wagner’s Ring Cycle (Der Ring des Nibelungen) in collaboration with the Estonian National Theatre Vanemuine and the Saaremaa Opera Festival.
Joost’s opera and ballet repertoire includes: Handel’s ‘Julius Caesar’; Mozart’s ‘Don Giovanni’, ‘The Marriage of Figaro’, ‘Idomeneo’, and ‘The Magic Flute’; Verdi’s ‘Aida’ and ‘La Traviata’; Bizet’s ‘Carmen’; Donizetti’s ‘The Elixir of Love’ and ‘Linda di Chamounix’; Puccini’s ‘La Bohème’, ‘Madam Butterfly’, ‘Tosca’, and ‘Turandot’; Gounod’s ‘Faust’; Tchaikovsky’s ‘Eugene Onegin’, ‘Swan Lake’, and ‘The Nutcracker’; Prokofiev’s ‘The Love for Three Oranges’ and ‘Romeo and Juliet’ as well as contemporary composers’ stage productions such as Tüür’s ‘Wallenberg’; Kõrvits’s ‘The Butterfly’; Aints’s ‘Modigliani – the Cursed Artist’; Kaumann’s ‘Department Store’; Krigul’s ‘The Swan Bone City’; and Varres’s ‘Hell’s New Old Nick’.
In 2022, he received the Estonian Theatre Union’s Music Award for his work as music director and conductor for the concert production of Idomeneo at the Estonian National Opera, and for the opera productions of Linda di Chamounix and Don Giovanni at the Estonian National Theatre Vanemuine.
For his artistic achievements in Estonia and abroad, Risto Joost received the Music Award of the Estonian Cultural Endowment in 2016, and was awarded the Young Cultural Figure Award of the Republic of Estonia in 2011. He was a prizewinner at the Malko Conducting Competition in 2015 and the Jorma Panula Conducting Competition in 2012.
Risto Joost studied at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, pursued further training at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, and graduated in 2008 from the Royal College of Music in Stockholm with a Master’s degree in orchestral conducting under Jorma Panula.